


Magic Storm Drabbles

by matsu1nino



Category: Arashi (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-02
Updated: 2018-08-12
Packaged: 2018-09-14 05:09:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 12,048
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9163588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/matsu1nino/pseuds/matsu1nino
Summary: Arashi at Hogwarts.





	1. First Year

**Sorting**

The first years were herded through the Great Hall in lines of two, feeling the eyes of every other student sitting at the four elongated tables staring at them as though they were walking alone. An old hat waited for them, resting on a chair in front of the professor’s table. Fukuyama-san was standing at the front with a scroll in his hand. Having already gone through the different houses before entering the hall, the first years anxiously awaited the time when their name was called. 

“When I call your name, you will come up to the front and I shall place the Sorting Hat on your head to determine your house,” said Fukuyama as he unravelled the scroll. “Aiba Masaki.”

Aiba had been standing next to Nino when he heard his name, his smile not falling but wavered with nerves as he hurried up to sit on the chair in front of everyone.

“Hmm,” the Sorting Hat began. “Ah right, let’s see what we have. Got to be…Hufflepuff.” Aiba’s smile grew with relief to have had such a hassle-free sorting. He hastily jumped off the stool to join the end of the Hufflepuff table, Nino nudging him encouragingly as he passed by. 

“Ikuta Toma.”

The next name was called and the small boy stepped up. The Sorting Hat was placed over his dark hair. It thought for a moment before declaring him another Hufflepuff. He hurried to join Aiba.

“Matsumoto Jun.”

Jun swallowed nervously as he made his way to the stool. He wasn’t really sure what house he would be in, nor which one he’d like to be placed into. He tried not to look directly at anyone as he waited for the choice to be made for him.

“Interesting…a very ambitious mind yet with an altruistic nature, better be Gryffindor.” Jun moved swiftly as soon as the Sorting Hat was removed from his head. Nino’s gaze trailed after him but was quickly drawn back when his own name was called. He kept a look of indifference on his face as he made his way to the chair. 

“Another interesting one,” The Sorting Hat hummed. “A lot of wit…talent and pride, a loyalty to those closest. In that case, got to be Slytherin.”

Nino wasn’t entirely sure how to take being placed in the serpent’s house. He had been as accepting as the other first years were with their houses until he saw the look of near disgust on the older student’s faces of the other tables. He knew Slytherin had a reputation as being the dishonest house so Nino was honestly relieved when he saw Aiba, Toma and Jun all still smiling at him.

“Ohno Satoshi.” The next name was called. The boy moved with a comfortably idle pace up to the front, where the Hat started to divulge the house qualities he exhibited. Before long it had placed him in Gryffindor for his apparent audacity.

The next first year to be called was Sakurai Sho. There was an air of apprehension as the first son of the renowned Sakurai family made his way to the stool. He shuffled about as he waited for the Sorting Hat to declare his house. His entire family had been in Ravenclaw and he was feeling pressured to ensure he was not the first to be placed elsewhere. ‘I’m smart. Put me in Ravenclaw. I’m precise. Put me in Ravenclaw. I’m a Sakurai. Put me in Ravenclaw’ were the only thoughts that were running through his mind as the hat was placed on his head.

“A good mind I see,” the Sorting Hat agreed with his internal assertion. “Ravenclaw.”

Sho almost shouted with relief when he heard the house name he’d been praying for. Still on a high from being placed in his desired house, Sho failed to notice how his foot had caught in his robes when he stood up. Taking one step forward sent him tumbling embarrassingly in front of the rest of the school.

 

**Potions Class**  

“Are you sure you know what you’re doing?” Nino asked warily when Aiba returned from the supplies closet carrying more ingredients and resources than he should have been able to carry. 

Their professor Ogura-san had only just finished checking on them when Aiba first suggested they make their experiment more interesting after Nino’s remark about how boring potions class was. The moment the teacher was at the other end of the classroom dealing with one of the other student groups, Aiba made a break for the cabinet.

Aiba let the copious amount of supplies tumble from his arms and spill out all over their joint workstation. Nino stared at it all with wide eyes, before turning his concerned gaze onto his long-time friend. When he’d agreed to let the taller student make things more interesting, he didn’t think that would mean increasing their sample size by ten.

“Of course I know what I’m doing!” Aiba grinned, already dumping a whole jar of moondew into the cauldron, followed by a handful of Moly flower.

Nino was anything but convinced. It was common knowledge that Aiba loved to experiment with whatever he could get his hands on. On this unfortunate day that included third-year potion ingredients and a vial of liquid nitrogen Nino could only assume Aiba had somehow managed to pinch from the Muggle Studies Classroom. It was easier to just turn a blind eye to some of the things his friend did. In this instance, Nino knew talking Aiba out of it by pointing out the danger factors would be pointless. Once his friend has his crazy mind set on something, there was no turning back. 

Seeing the potion bubbling and frothing fiercely with the addition of the liquid nitrogen, Nino subtly started to back away to what he believed was a safe distance. Aiba didn’t notice of course. He was too busy opening a container of fire seeds.

“You’re going to blow it up,” Nino warned in vain. Aiba wasn’t even listening as he pulled a few seeds from the container with tweezers. He dropped them into his concoction. Nothing happened. 

Aiba shared his look of disappointment with Nino but their attention was quickly drawn back to the cauldron that was starting to let off a thin steam. The mixture began to bubble, becoming angrier with every passing moment. The potion was growing worryingly close to the rim of the cauldron as the hissing mass of bubbling liquid threatened to pour over. Little spurts of the potion dribbled down the side, sizzling as it hit the burner beneath and made the blue flame flare orange. The fire lapped up at the cauldron that continued to spill its overwhelming contents. Aiba jumped back from the reaction and turned to Nino with a look of absolute fascination that came crashing down moments later by the outraged voice of their teacher.

“What are you two doing?”

 

**Why Dragons Don’t Make Good Pets**

Toma entered the Great Hall after having finished packing for the Christmas holidays. He spotted his three friends sitting at one of the dining tables, their attention focused on something he couldn’t see from where he was. As he hurried over to join them, his eyes went wide when he laid eyes on what they were all staring at. 

“Is that a dragon?” Toma asked in disbelief at the baby reptile between them, convinced he must be seeing things. Jun nodded, being the only one of them to have actually acknowledged his arrival. “Where did you get it?”

“Ask Aiba-chan, he’s the one who found it,” Nino said. Toma looked expectantly at Aiba but his eyes kept being drawn to the small grey creature walking on the table in front of him.

“Isn't he cute?” exclaimed Aiba, reaching out to tentatively stroke the dragon’s head with a finger. “I think I’m going to call him Ren.”

Toma nodded as Jun turned to Aiba. “He is, but you still haven’t told us where you got him?”

Aiba rubbed his head bashfully. “I may have kind of found him…in the Dark Forest.” His three friends turned to him with similar looks of astonishment on their faces. 

“You found a baby dragon all alone in the Dark Forest?” A look of doubt crossed Nino's face while he asked his rhetorical question. 

“Maybe it had been abandoned,” Jun offered, though still sounded unconvinced himself. 

“He was!” Aiba agreed. His shout was very defensive and made his friends even more doubtful. He bit his lip. “O-Okay, so let’s say I came across an abandoned egg and maybe I might have nursed it until it hatched.”

“Masaki!” The three of them exclaimed in near perfect unison, making the tall Hufflepuff wince. They mightn’t know much about raising a dragon but they had learnt enough about the species to know how protective dragons were of their young. If Aiba really had found the egg and hatched it, a job which in itself would take at least a week of nursing depending on how far along the baby was, they could expect a livid adult fire breather somewhere in those woods.

This didn’t seem to have dawned on Aiba at all, who was still cooing over the dragon hatchling. Clearly he was content to remain ignorant.

“I wonder how long it will take for Ren to eat solids,” he wondered aloud, giggling as it gnawed on the end of his finger with its toothless gums.

“Idiot, don’t name it,” Nino scolded, giving him a whack on the head.


	2. Second Year

**Sweet Train Ride**

“Anyone feel like something from the sweets trolley?”

Those were the fateful words that had started it all. The initial responses were a couple of shrugs, "don’t mind’s" and a soft snore from the one person in the carriage who had been sleeping. Of course when the trolley had come around and Sho used his money, courtesy of his family, to buy what he thought was enough for everyone, all hell broke loose. 

It had only taken Nino stealing a few of Aiba’s chocolate frogs midway into their snacking for the taller boy to launch himself at the Slytherin, tackling him into the seat in an attempt to regain his stolen goods that somehow ended up as a merciless tickle fight. Sho and Jun tried to break the two apart, managing to knock half of their sweet stash onto the floor in the process. Aiba kicked out, his foot accidentally colliding with the stomach of Sho who had been trying to pry him away from Nino. Sho stumbled and landed on his backside on the mess of sweets scattering the floor of the carriage. 

The tussle stopped for a moment as Aiba realized what he’d done, guilt gathering in his stomach when he saw the sticky patch on Sho’s robes. He muttered an apology, but quickly went back to wrestling with Nino after the younger’s comment on how Aiba should help Sho accessorize more often. Jun continued to try and pull them off one another but ended up getting squashed painfully against the side of the carriage by their writhing bodies locked together as they rolled over the cushioned seats. Aiba was demanding Nino to apologize, though for which of his most recent deeds he should atone for was not clear.

Nino was screaming for Aiba to stop, his sides aching from the torturous laughter the incessant tickling was pulling from him. He was certain his ribs would be bruised after enduring the countless pokes from Aiba’s bony fingers. Someone must have heard his prayers, he realized, as he felt the weight lift from his body. Aiba had rolled too close to the edge of the seat and ended up tumbling onto the floor in a similar grace to Sho. Nino had only half a second of amusement and relief before realizing Aiba still had his legs locked around his waist, and was tugging him down to the floor as well. Nino desperately clutched onto the nearest thing he could—Jun. The youngest did what he could to haul Nino back up onto the seat, but in the end gravity won out and he was dragged down on top of the tangled pile of limbs. 

Ohno yawned and stretched, awaking from his nap. He couldn’t recall when exactly he had fallen asleep but the sight that greeted him when he woke was far from what he had been expecting. His four friends were sitting equally spread out from one another, each a sugary mess. No one cared to explain to their sleepy friend what had happened.

 

**Broomstick Fail**

There was a reason Sho didn’t like flying. Sure he had a known fear of heights that contributed, but seeing as though flying lessons were still part of the curriculum and thus educational, he had forced himself over the obstacle…or so he thought. When he was a first year, his experience of flying included being embarrassed in front of his entire class after having what he would classify as a ‘mild’ freak-out. Okay, so screaming his lungs out while hovering only a few metres off the ground might not be what others would consider mild, but for him he saw nothing wrong with wanting to remain on solid ground. 

It was in his second year that he somehow managed to find himself volunteering to teach Aiba how to play Quidditch. Well, volunteering might be a bit of a stretch. Being coerced by Nino would be the more accurate explanation of how he ended up in such an unfortunate situation. Jun and Ohno were no help in pointing out he knew Quidditch the best out of all of them given how much he read. He cursed himself for his studious habits. 

Sho stood on the edge of the Quidditch field, fully-clad in all the safety gear he could find on such short notice. It wasn’t much; just arm, shin and chest guards, each fitted with extra padding, a crotch guard and a reinforced helmet he had tracked down. Not merely enough. 

Aiba was already there, rearing to go by the looks of it. He could barely stand still and Sho saw him drop his broom twice in the time it took for him to walk over. The other three were there too, standing beside the chest containing the Quidditch balls. They took one look at his outfit before bursting into laughter. Sho frowned. It was bad enough they were allowing him to do this and now they were making fun of his safety getup. Some friends they were. 

“Let’s get this over with,” he whined, hating the way his words came out as a nervous squeak even as he tried to keep his voice level. Aiba was buzzing with excitement. “But first there are some safety precautions we should—”

He didn’t get to finish as Aiba practically jumped onto his broom and took off. “Come on, Sho-chan!” he yelled back at him. “Let’s play!”

Sho tried to protest when Ohno steered him towards his own broomstick and hovered until Sho gave in and climbed on. “This is not going to end well,” he muttered, mostly to himself as he kicked off the ground. His words were followed closely by a frightened cry.

“Five gold galleons says he falls off before we pass them the balls,” Nino bet.

“You’re on,” Jun agreed as Ohno declared he wanted in on the bet as well.

Even though Sho hadn’t heard their betting on his failure, he wasn’t feeling any more confident with this. He wasn’t that far off the ground but knowing there was only a stick of wood between him and a painful though highly unlikely fatal drop wasn’t doing much to calm his nerves. If he was honest, he thought he was going to die, especially when Aiba zoomed down passed him. The gust of wind created by his reckless speed was almost enough to knock Sho right off his broom. He managed to catch himself but had twisted around on his broom.

Attempting to get back the right way up was the last thing on his mind as he clutched on with both his arms and legs. He tried not to stretch his head back, knowing he’d end up seeing how high off the ground he was. He whimpered slightly as he hugged the broom. His legs were starting to slip and his arms had pins and needles. When the last of his strength faded and his limbs gave out, he fell with a scream. It was only a few seconds before he actually hit the ground.

Sho lay winded, his heart racing as he recovered from seeing his life having flashed before his eyes. He could faintly hear the laughter from his friends between reassuring calls telling him he was fine and had only fallen about a metre and a half from his broom.

Aiba landed and joined in the laughter. Nino high-fived him while handing him half of his winnings from the bet. Jun and Ohno stared in surprise as they realized Aiba had been in on the wager from the very start.

 

**The Perks of Studying**

There was nothing fun about studying, Ohno had discovered. Hogwarts was just like any other school when it came to homework; there was plenty of it from every subject and no excuse sufficient enough for not getting it done on time. Like Muggle students, they also had exams every year which they had to be fully prepared for.

If Ohno was honest, he’d spent most of his study time last year and this year drifting off instead. He couldn’t help it. There was just something so sleep-inducing about trying to stay awake. Sometimes he would study in the Gryffindor common room, either alone or occasionally with Jun, but mostly he would be in the Study Hall with his four friends. It certainly made for useful note copying time, especially when he did nod off and needed to catch up.

Each of his friends had their own methods of studying. Sho would hit every subject with all he had and always made the most notes. Unfortunately they were impossible for anyone other than Sho to decipher. His excessive studying was definitely a result of the expectation his family held for him.

Nino was almost the complete opposite of Sho. He was lazy when it came to studying. He would hardly ever take notes, occasionally jotting a few things down that he’d copied from someone else’s book. Yet somehow he always ended up with good marks. Whenever they got together to study, he would spend most of his time playing with his deck of cards.

Aiba would take plenty of notes in class, or so it would appear at first glance. The illegible scribbles were actually usually made up of his own ideas for spells, potions or other magical experiments he was keen on trying. When it came time for exams or handing in homework, Aiba would often pester one of the other four about any parts he couldn’t remember or work out for himself.

Jun took studying seriously. Not in a crazy obsessive way like Sho did, but he always wanted to make sure that the work he handed in was his best. Even for the subjects he hated he felt a strange need to perfect it. Ohno would often find Jun studying alone in the common room or on his bed adding final details to something anyone else would have deemed good enough eight edits ago.

Ohno lifted his head from the table and blinked the sleep from his eyes. His friends were gathered around him. Jun and Sho were sitting together with Jun reading his work out loud to Sho and making changes himself as he went. Sho’s eyebrows were furrowed deeply as he half listened to Jun while trying to remember his own notes. Nino and Aiba were sitting adjacent. Aiba was rambling on about his newest experimental idea—Ohno overheard something about green peppers and the Black Lake—while partaking in the card trick Nino was currently in the middle of performing. Ohno looked down and saw that four copies of notes had been inserted into his book. A sweet smile graced his lips.

Maybe studying wasn’t so bad after all.


	3. Third Year

**Forest Kiss**

Jun made his way down through the grounds of Hogwarts on his way to the Dark Forest where today’s Care for Magical Creatures lesson was being held. He enjoyed the subject but there was something about today that made it hard for him to focus. His gaze was drawn to his Slytherin friend walking slightly ahead of him, chatting avidly with Sho, and Jun immediately knew he’d found his reason. He had been sending Jun weird looks all week, reaching the point where Jun could actually feel Nino’s eyes whenever they were on him and causing his chest to tighten uncomfortably whenever he was around his friend.

Even as their lesson started and Shimura-san rambled on about the Flobberworms they would be feeding and studying, Jun saw Nino send a secret glance his way. His hands clenched, a familiar tightness spreading through his torso and he found himself biting his lip. It seemed whatever Nino was doing had finally gotten on the younger’s nerves.

Jun saw opportunity when the lesson officially began and their professor was distracted helping some of the other students feed lettuce to the strange invertebrates. He moved swiftly over to where Nino was standing, seizing his arm with more strength than perhaps was necessary. Nino stared in surprise at Jun’s sudden presence and though his confusion only increased when Jun pulled him away from the rest of their class, Nino kept silent the whole time and allowed the younger to drag him wherever he wanted.

They ended up in a secluded clearing further in the woods, far away from the prying eyes of their classmates but still close enough for their voices to be faintly heard. Nino gazed around at his surroundings. The light was pouring in through the canopy and bathing the whole clearing in a soft, dappled glow of golden. He nodded to himself, impressed by the scenery, before turning back to Jun with a playful smirk on his face.

“You know if you wanted to ask me out, you didn’t have to go for such a romantic setting. I’m not that hard to please,” he teased, loving the way Jun’s face went red with a pleasant mix of embarrassment and irritation.

“That’s not what this is about!” Jun denied, feeling his ears burning at the awkward conversation turn which he had not been anticipating.

“Too bad.”

Jun almost missed Nino’s disappointed murmur, but shook it off as his friend being a tease or him mishearing. “I want to know why you’ve been staring at me lately,” he pushed on regardless of the discomfort. He watched Nino closely as he paced around the clearing in circles around him.

“Do you really not know?” Nino’s question took Jun by surprise. He thought back over everything that had happened prior to when he first started receiving the looks, wondering if there was anything he’d done to annoy his friend. Nothing came to mind so he shook his head. 

Nino gave a soft sigh, his eyes suddenly seeming dull and drained. Eyes that Jun was so used to seeing sparkling with mischief and emotions more complex than anyone could possibly comprehend. It hurt to think he had caused that, even if he wasn’t entirely sure how.

Jun was so caught up in the emotion revealing eyes of his friend that he wasn’t aware how close Nino had gotten until he was practically on top of him. Jun tensed and took a step back, but found he couldn’t move any further than that even when Nino continued to close the gap between them. He stretched his head up, standing a little higher on the balls of his feet. Jun could feel his breath hot against the skin of his cheek as Nino whispered a soft, almost inaudible, “I like you.”

There was no time for the words to register in Jun’s brain as Nino closed the spaced between their lips. It was gentle and nervous, little more than a soft touch of their lips. But it was far from clumsy and far from awkward. Neither side seemed to know what was going on but reacted to their instincts, pressing a little firmer from time to time to intensify the heat of the kiss. Jun’s arms came up to hold Nino. His hand moved over the smaller boy’s arms in gentle strokes that were barely felt through the heavy material of his robes, but were still enough to send shivers through Nino’s body.

Nino’s usually sharp tongue slipped past the guard of Jun’s lips and plunged deep inside his mouth, having gained more confidence after feeling Jun kiss back. Their tongues battled for dominance as the kiss gained more passion. They held each other with a near painfully tight grip but neither seemed to care as their bodies were pressed together, all else forgotten in the heat of the moment.

They eventually broke apart when they were both in need of air. They pulled away, each looking slightly disorientated from the kiss with eyes glazed over and hair a mess from the other’s hands that had been entangled in it moments ago. Nino chewed his swollen bottom lip anxiously as he came back to his senses, nervous that Jun would walk away and never speak of what they had done ever again. To his immense relief and shock, his Gryffindor friend smiled back at him and helped readjust his robe from where it had fallen off his shoulder at some point during the kiss.

“So we’re okay?” Nino dared to ask, still fearing what the answer could be. Jun nodded. He opened his mouth, ready to answer, when someone else’s voice cut him off. 

“After that, I should hope so!”

Both boys whipped around to find the other three at the edge of the clearing, sitting and leaning against some rocks, grinning at their friends caught in the act. Their comfortable positions made Jun and Nino wonder just how long they had been there.

 

**Transfiguration Mishaps**

“Guys!”

Aiba’s cry for help resonated throughout the hallways and his friends wouldn’t have been surprised if people on the other side of the school could have heard him. He came crashing through the doors of the Recreation Hall where Sho, Ohno and Nino had been lounging. Their Hufflepuff friend was panting hard, slamming the doors and leaning against it with all his weight to keep it shut. He was thankful the four of them were the only ones that ever seemed to reside in the hall.

Sho was the first to approach Aiba, startling the latter who had been peering through the cracks of the door. He visibly jumped when Sho put a hand on his shoulder.

“Aiba, calm down,” Sho tried to get him to relax. After ensuring he had taken a few deep breaths to prevent himself from hyperventilating, Sho gently led him away from the closed doors and back to the others. “What happened?”

Aiba’s chest was still heaving as his eyes flickered with fear, reliving the memory of whatever had scared the living daylights out of him. “Y-You know how I found that sixth grader’s Transfiguration textbook?” he asked, receiving nods from all three of his friends.

Aiba had come across it about a week ago and had been studying it obsessively ever since. Sho had tried to persuade him to hand it in to the Transfigurations professor Fukuyama-san, but Aiba chose to ignore him instead. Transfigurations was his favourite class, second only perhaps to Care of Magical Creatures, and one of his best subjects. He had a natural talent for it, even Fukuyama had said so himself, and most people in their year knew that Aiba was eager to learn how to become an animagus.

If what had him running through the school like he had a Dementor after him had something to do with that textbook, his friends knew it couldn’t be good.

“Well, you see, Jun was sort of helping me out with it. You know, as an assistant,” Aiba continued. Sho felt his blood run cold as he feared where this was going. He exchanged a knowing glance with Ohno. “We were trying out some basic human transfiguration spells, and well…”

Nino was looking torn between being about to laugh and wanting to strangle Aiba for answers. There was no chance to do either as they were interrupted by a strangled moan coming from outside the door. Ohno stood from his seat and went to see what it was. Aiba gave a frightened squeal and hid behind Sho as the door was opened. Ohno stumbled when a black blur shot between his legs and headed straight for Aiba. He screamed again and ran for his life, darting in and out of the furniture situated all around the hall.

“I’m sorry!” he yelled as he sprinted to avoid the dark bundle that was chasing him. “It was an accident! We’ll get you back to normal, I swear!”

As he clambered over one of the chairs, his foot caught and he toppled over to the ground. His pursuer launched at him, but Sho darted from where he was and managed to catch it mid-air. They were finally able to get a good look at what had become of their friend. Sho held the thrashing feline in his arms, desperately trying to keep him away from Aiba while preventing his own mauling. Ohno and Nino helped give Aiba a hand up.

“You turned Jun into a panther cub?” Nino questioned as he stared at the fierce but undeniably adorable kitten in Sho’s hold. Jun snarled at Aiba.

“Why didn’t you just use a reverse transfiguration spell?” Ohno pondered.

Aiba let his head hang low. “I tried…but the counter spell kind of made him a pantheress instead.”

There was a moment of silence as Aiba’s words sunk in.

Sho let out an exasperated sigh. “No wonder he’s trying to kill you.”

 

**One Can Never Have Too Many Pets**

It was a known fact that Aiba loved animals. Care for Magical Creatures was about the only subject which he didn’t try to experiment in; he would often spend his free time helping Shimura take care of whatever creatures he could. Animals seemed to love him, a little too much perhaps. He practically owned a zoo back at home and always seemed to have at least one new pet every year. Any creature he found abandoned or hurt he would adopt into his already impressive family of animals.

So really, his friends shouldn’t have been overly surprised when they saw him enter the train carriage holding a Knarl. The predictability of the situation didn’t stop them from questioning Aiba, however.

“Another new pet?” Jun remarked with a raised eyebrow as he looked at the hedgehog-like creature.

“How many is that now?” Nino asked with a teasing grin, already knowing the number was going to surpass any of their expectations.

“Not that many,” Aiba mumbled, giving his newest critter a loving scratch under its chin. His eyebrows creased in thought as he counted each of his animal companions in his head. “Dashi is my eight—ninth pet. Look how cute she is though!”

The Knarl’s name was attention-grabbing but not all together a surprise given some of the names of Aiba’s other pets. The plump ginger cat he’s owned since first year was dubbed ‘Curry’, as Aiba claimed he would always jump up on the table whenever and only whenever his family ate curry. His other cat, a previously stray Russian blue she-cat which his friends had only ever seen when they visited Aiba’s family home in the holidays, was named Bonito.

Another pet that stayed at home rather than coming with Aiba to Hogwarts was Mochi, his Portlock horse. Sho was shocked when he first saw it, knowing that Portlocks were usually mistrustful of humans, so keeping one as a pet was almost unheard of. Ohno had found a Niffler in their second year and given it to Aiba as he didn’t know what to do with it. Aiba had named the treasure-hunting creature Sesame, on the claim of its skin being of sesame resemblance.

Like most other students, Aiba also had an owl as a pet and messenger. Nino knew that the bird actually belonged to his little brother but allowed Aiba to take it into Hogwarts with him. The owl that was his own was one he had found with an injured wing. Shimura had helped teach him how to nurse it back to proper health, allowing the student to keep it under the condition that he took care of it well. Aiba of course assured he would do just that. Thus Panko came into their lives.

In his first year he had come across a lost toad, Mapo, and kept it, much to the distress of Toma who was forced to share a room with him. Earlier this year, Jun had been with Aiba in Hogsmeade village when he found a store with a rare domesticated bat for purchase. Before even buying it, Aiba had already named it Pan. It had taken all of the money his family had given him for that term, and an additional I.O.U payment from Jun but he had gotten his beloved new pet.

His friends often wondered how many animals it would take for Aiba to finally decide he had enough pets. Chaos was ensured with the number of creatures he kept, or so his friends would have thought. They had never actually seen any of the animals fighting with one another. Maybe they would just have to wait until Aiba decided to get another dragon.


	4. Fourth Year

**At the Black Lake**

Ohno loved his friends. Nothing in this world would make him want to change or replace any of them, but there were times when he needed space. They were individuals after all; five very different people, so it was only natural that each of them had their own methods of escape. Aiba had his endless horde of animals, Sho had his studies to focus on, Nino had his cards and games that he liked to play, while Jun had his books he read whenever he needed a distraction from reality. Ohno knew his friends probably assumed sleep was his way of personal stress relief. Part of him was glad they thought that, as it stole focus away from his real escape: fishing. 

There were few activities that Ohno could really immerse himself in freely. Art was one, but without the time to spare to paint while at Hogwarts that was usually a hobby kept exclusively for when he went home for the holidays.

Fishing was something special. Very few students ever went down to the Black Lake so he could enjoy the seclusion of having his own fishing hole. In his first two years at Hogwarts, he'd had to construct his own makeshift fishing rod using whatever materials he could find. It was good enough that it didn’t break apart straight away, though he did have to make some repairs every few months. It wasn’t until third year and he’d learnt the right charm to conjure a proper line that he actually managed to catch anything. In his fourth year Transfigurations class he’d been taught transformation spells powerful enough to manipulate a stick into an actual rod.

Now he sat happily on the lakeside, settled comfortably between thick roots contorted around him to form arm rests while his back leant against the surprisingly comfortable tree trunk. He had his legs folded over one another and the rod in his hands as he swung in and out of consciousness. The peacefulness of the rare solitude he got when he was fishing was unlike anything else. He knew that soon he would have to leave as his free period wouldn’t last forever. The breaks he used for fishing never seemed to last very long; though that may have something to do with the fact that he more than often dozed off in the middle of the pastime. He had even missed the beginnings of some classes due to waking up late after a lazy fishing afternoon or been late meeting up with his friends because he’d gotten a bite and been on a roll with his catches. It didn’t bother him that much though. The Black Lake was his special escape.

 

**Written in the Tea Leaves**

As Shibata-san blabbered on about the so-called mystical gift of being able to read a mess of tea remains, Nino wondered, admittedly not for the first time that year, how he’d ended up stuck with Divination as a subject. He knew why. His friends all had their preferred choices for the electives they’d be taking for third and fourth year. Care of Magical Creatures was a mutual vote for the first of three electives. Muggles Studies had been their second, after some debate. Sho had been keen to take Arithmancy, Ohno didn’t care what his third choice was and left it up to the others to decide amongst themselves on the claim that he would go with whatever they decided. Aiba was fascinated by Divination and after much pestering, he managed to convince Jun into taking it with him. The decision was then up to Nino. The thought of taking Arithmancy made him want to hurl. The only other choice not already suggested was Study of Ancient Runes but even if he were to choose that, he’d either have to take it alone or go with the majority anyway. He knew Sho had a particular dissatisfaction with the Divination professor for her inappropriate approach to some of her male students, those of which included a certain uncomfortable Sakurai, and that in itself had its own appeal.

So in the end taking Divination had been his own choice, but that didn’t stop him from thinking his card tricks had more magical capacity than this bunch of mystical mumbo-jumbo. Still he got to be with his friends, spend time with Jun and watch Sho squirm in discomfort every time Shibata came near him, so he supposed it wasn’t so bad.

Aiba gulped down the last of his tea and shoved it into Nino’s hands before holding out his own expectantly. Nino passed his cup to his overenthusiastic friend.

“What does mine say?” he asked excitedly. Nino rolled his eyes as he flicked through the Taessomancy book in search of the symbols that matched Aiba’s tea leaves.

“A warning,” he replied, trying to keep the sarcasm subtle even though if Aiba bothered to notice he would realize that Nino wasn’t even reading from the text. Aiba didn’t however and the excitement fell from his face.

“What kind of warning?” his voice was shaking slightly, his eyes wide with worry.

“Bad things will come your way if you don’t give your best friend money and quit annoying him.” His joke was met with a not so painless whack on the head. “Ow, geez I was just kidding. You have a sun, which surprise-surprise means happiness, idiot.”

Aiba’s grin returned without even registering the insult. He rotated Nino’s cup in his hands, squinting to make out the shapes. He hummed to himself. “You have an up arrow, which is a good direction.”

“Successful direction,” Nino corrected, sitting back in his chair with his arms folded.

“And there’s a female symbol. So that either means you’re heading for a successful sex change…Ow!” Nino kicked him under the table. “Or you’ve a good turn in your romance life on the way. Wow, either way that’s got to be exciting.”

Nino gave him a shove that Aiba managed to dodge this time. As if he believed in any of that fortune-telling nonsense. Even as he looked away with a pout, his eyes were drawn to where Jun was sitting in one of the behind rows with Toma. He couldn’t help but smile a little. Good things romantically. Maybe he could live with accepting one fortune.

 

**House Loyalty**

It was the first weekend of November and as such the Gryffindor versus Slytherin Quidditch match. Jun walked side by side with Toma as they headed down to the field to secure good spots in the spectator stands. It had been about twenty minutes since they had just wished their mutual friend Shun from Slytherin luck with the game. Since leaving the Great Hall, Toma had been quizzing Jun as to which team he was rooting for. It was the same question he’d been asking at this time of year since making friends with third year student Oguri Shun back when they were second years. Jun always gave the same answer of both teams.

“Shun’s my friend, why is it such a terrible thing that I want his team to do well?” Jun asked, sighing tiredly as he repeated the same words he’d said more times than he cared to count.

Toma raised his hands defensively. “I’m not saying it’s bad that you want him to do well, heck he’s my friend too, but don’t you think you should prioritise cheering for your own team when they play against each other?”

“Is that what you do?” Toma nodded, not necessarily to Jun’s surprise. He knew Toma always rooted for Hufflepuff to win no matter who they were up against. Something about house loyalty.

Jun didn’t see it that way. He of course wanted Gryffindor to win but Shun was one of his closest friends, outside the four loveable idiots he spent majority of his time with. It was only natural to give his support to a friend.

As they walked, they passed the Quidditch tents where both teams were getting reading for the game that was to come. Jun recognized Gryffindor’s team captain and lead chaser Nagase Tomoya giving his pre-match prep talk. The red and gold colours decorating the tent and team were almost blinding to the eye, though that may have had something more to do with Toma’s questions cutting a little deeper than he’d expected. Part of him did want to give more support to his team but he didn’t have the same house loyalty that Toma did. Maybe it was a Hufflepuff thing. Or perhaps, Jun thought as they made it to the stands, it was because almost all the friends he’d made since first year, sans Ohno, were from other houses. Those were the people that earnt his loyalty, for being the loving and wonderful people they were, not because they were placed in the same house as he was.

The Quidditch match was a thrilling and close game. Shun impressively managed to almost singlehandedly keep the bludgers away from his team despite there being two beaters. Nagase did a great job as a chaser of Gryffindor, scoring multiple goals, and certainly lived up to his status as captain. In the end Slytherin had won by a hairsbreadth and Jun may have been the only Gryffindor in the stands who was still cheering by the end of it.

“Still can't choose a team?” Toma joked with a light-hearted grin as the game wrapped up. Jun said nothing, just returned the smile. So he switched his cheering repeatedly through the game and had to make his own modified banners to hold at matches. It didn’t bother him.


	5. Fifth Year

**Yule Ball**

Nino and Jun had been sitting in the courtyard watching the students run back and forth, flustered as they tried to find dates for the upcoming Yule Ball. The two of them had been some of the first, not only in their year, to score dates and hadn’t even been the ones to ask. Seeing as though they couldn’t go together, they figured taking Hufflepuff’s Inoue Mao and Gryffindor’s Yoshitaka Yuriko instead would be the next best option. With their own dates settled they were free to enjoy the sight of girls crowding together and gossiping about why they hadn’t been asked out yet, while boys in every year were freaking out about who to ask and how to ask when the girls never isolated themselves long enough to allow them the chance. What they weren’t expecting to see, however, was one of their own friends peeking out from behind a pillar to spy on a pair of fifth year girls.

Aiba was hiding. Actually he was panicking. When he’d first heard the announcement for the Yule Ball, there was only one girl that came to mind that he wanted to ask: the quick-witted Ravenclaw, Becky. He had been crushing on her since third year, something that all his friends knew and conveniently loved teasing him about even if he denied they were just friends. It wasn’t a complete lie. Becky certainly only saw him as a friend and until now Aiba had never found the courage to ask her on a date. But the Yule Ball was the perfect excuse to ask her out. If only he could find out how to make his feet work again so he could go over and talk to her. Stalking her and her best friend Aya from behind a pole wasn’t the best look. At least no one seemed to have noticed.

“You know staring at her from here isn't going to get you out of the friend-zone.” Aiba jumped at the sound of Nino’s voice, whipping around to find him and Jun standing next to him with matching smirks.

“Actually it might,” Jun argued. “Can you imagine she’ll want to stay friends with someone who watches her like this?”

Nino nodded. “It’s just downright creepy.”

Aiba let his chin fall to his chest with his hands burying themselves in his hair, prepared to tear it right out of his head if it would get him out of this heart-wrenching situation.

“You guys have it easy,” he whined as he sunk down onto the stone bench. “Your dates asked you out.” His friends took a seat either side of him.

“Listen,” said Nino, putting a hand on Aiba’s shoulder to snap him out of his depressed state. All snark had vanished from his tone. “It’s not as bad as you think. We mightn’t have had to do anything for this ball thing, but that doesn’t mean we don’t know it's like. Do you think asking Jun out was easy?”

Aiba thought back a few years to when he, Sho and Ohno had come across the two of them in the Dark Woods. Back then he hadn’t realized they weren’t already together, given how comfortable they’d seemed sucking on each other’s tonsils, but looking back he could see how significantly their relationship changed after that incident.

“Becky is only with Aya,” Jun pointed out, bringing Aiba back from his reminiscing. “I’m sure when you go over there, she will give you two space and then you can ask her. Just try it. Even if she rejects you, she’ll most likely respect you for having the guts to ask.”

They didn’t really give Aiba any say in the matter as they dragged him up and pushed him out from behind the pillar. With his heart hammering against his chest, Aiba willed his feet to move him across the courtyard over to where the two Ravenclaws were chatting. Aya exchanged a knowing glance with Aiba when he approached and excused herself, just as Jun predicted.

“Aiba-kun,” Becky said politely, though the cheeky glint in her eyes told another story. Aiba shuffled around, shifting his weight from foot to foot and trying to look anywhere but at her.

“Becky, I-I was wondering…if maybe you’d want to go to the Yule Ball…with me?” He hesitantly stumbled his way through the question. Becky chewed the inside of her mouth as she raised an eyebrow questioningly at him. Aiba looked up briefly enough to catch her stare and panicked. “Ah! I mean, unless someone else has already asked you…or of course you don’t want to go with me. I should have known. I mean I did know, but those two idiots made me come over to talk to you when I was perfectly content with watching from behind that pole…Ah, that’s not what I meant! I wasn’t stalking you or anything. Great, now you think I’m creep—”

Aiba’s flustered rant was cut off as Becky gave him a light smack upside the head, silencing him in moments. His hand went to his head to rub the now sore spot as he stared at her with his bottom lip slightly trembling. She sighed and tugged on his arm to pull him down to her level. Her lips pressed softly against his cheek, just grazing the corner of his mouth.

“Took you long enough, idiot.” It was all she said before turning on her heel and heading over to where Aya was waiting for her. Aiba watched the two of them walk away, Becky glancing quickly over her shoulder at him with a sweet but shy smile that made the corners of her eyes crinkle.

Jun and Nino, who had observed the whole thing from a distance, came over to Aiba’s side. “How’d it go?” they asked. Aiba’s hand moved to where he’d received her intimate touch. His bright smile stretched from ear to ear.

“I think I just got a date.”

 

**Patronus Charm**

One of the perks of always getting such high marks was the admiration and respect that came from the teachers. Another was the extra, advanced spell books Sho was often given as additional study. Unfortunately the drawback of receiving such benefits was having four nosey friends who always wanted to try their luck with the spells that were usually too advanced for even Sho to get a handle on. One of said spells was the Patronus Charm.

“It says we need to conjure and focus on nothing but our happiest memory in order to power the incantation,” Sho read aloud to his friends against his better judgement. There were no specific potential dangers listed for the difficult spell, other than a warning for dark wizards or witches who may attempt to cast it. Sho was pretty sure none of his friends were dark wizards though.

They were currently occupying one of the unused rooms along the fourth floor corridor so the risk of having anyone interrupting them was reduced. Sho knew how unlikely it was that any of them would be able to cast even an incorporeal patronus, let alone a full-formed one. Still, it wouldn’t stop them from trying.

About fifteen minutes in of them each repeating the spell at an irregular pattern, only achieving the tiniest shapeless wisps from the ends of their wand that evaporated soon after being cast, there was a blinding expulsion of silver. Four of them stopped their attempts to turn and stare at the successful incantation. Jun’s wand was glowing a dazzling white extending into a stream of bright mist that moulded into the striped cat-like shape that was currently stalking through the air around their heads. His friends erupted in a chorus of praises and cheers.

“You did it!”

“Your patronus is a tiger? How’d you do that?”

“That’s amazing!”

“I’d have thought Aiba would have been the first of us to conjure it,” Ohno thought out loud.

Jun smiled, his eyes fixed on his patronus as he admitted, “So did I.”

“Masaki probably can't focus on a _single_ happy memory,” Nino laughed with more truth in his joke than he realized.

“When you have a memory, just let it fill you,” Jun instructed while his tiger started running through the classroom as if pursuing an imaginary prey. “Think of nothing else.”

As Jun continued watching his patronus and keeping it alive with his happy memory, the others returned to trying themselves. Only a few minutes had passed before another light was emitted. This time it was from Ohno’s wand. The light, shapeless and pale at first, swirled about as his patronus took its corporeal form. Before long they had a fish swimming above them.

“No fair!” Nino whined while his patronus attempt died on the end of his wand yet again. “How did Oh-chan manage to cast one? His mind’s almost always blank.”

“Only when I need it to be,” Ohno retorted, not at all sounding offended. His eyes were lit up as he watched his fishy patronus.

Aiba laughed upon seeing his delighted expression. “You can't fish it, Satoshi.”

Even as he was giggling, the tip of his wand began to glow fiercely as a third patronus was born. The silver light elongated from the top of the spirit animal’s head and the next thing the boys knew, they had a hare bounding around over their heads, followed closely by Aiba’s breathy laugh resonating throughout the room.

“Now I’m really depressed,” Nino pouted.

Jun moved over to him and pressed up against the shorter boy. “Forget about everything else,” he whispered close to his ear. “What do you think I was thinking about when I created mine?” The words were left to linger in Nino’s mind even after Jun walked away, trying to keep his tiger under control as it began to chase Aiba’s rabbit all over the room.

“Keep it away from mine!” Aiba shouted as his wand tugged a little against his hand.

The sound faded from Nino’s awareness and he allowed the image of Jun’s implication to fill his mind till the point that he could think of nothing else. His wand started to tremble a little as the incantation built up. Muttering the words with a few circular wrist motions, the patronus he’d been waiting for was finally released. He saw the long thin muzzle and bushy tail of his corporeal form before it leapt high into the air.

“Fox. Can’t say I’m surprised,” Ohno hummed with more brazenness than Nino had been expecting.

“Oi, what’s that supposed to mean?” he demanded though his voice held little evidence of being actually offended. The playful canine started to join in the chase of Aiba’s poor hare patronus. Jun grinned at Nino.

“I knew you could do it.”

Sho, the only one so far who had been unable to cast his patronus, felt himself getting really frustrated. He was the one who their professor had given the spell book to. He was supposed to be the one able to achieve a patronus, not watch as his four friends had their incantations run circles around him, literally.

“You’re overthinking it,” Sho heard Ohno mumble from beside him, making him frown further. He just wanted to sit in the corner and sulk, not have his friends judge him for his inability to replicate the spell they all made seem so simple.

“It doesn’t have to be a hard as you’re making it, Sho-chan,” Jun said gently. “You only need one memory.”

Aiba hugged Sho’s arm, almost dropping his wand in the process. “Think of a time when you were happy beyond reason! When you couldn’t stop smiling even though your cheeks hurt so badly.”

“A time when you allowed your emotions to rule you,” Nino added while his fox gave another frisky leap.

Sho shook his head. “I can't think of any…” he admitted reluctantly. All the memories that had come to mind were of when he’d received his exam scores or praises from teachers, or the rare approval he saw from his father when he was at home for the holidays. Every memory was tainted with the fear of failure. His friends told him as much.

“What about a memory with us?” Aiba asked.

Sho blinked in surprise. He loved his friends but why they hadn’t come up in his collection of happy memories was something he couldn’t explain. He could only guess it was because he had never associated friendship with happiness, just a relief or distraction from the pressures of everyday life. Deep down he knew that wasn’t right. He was never happier than when he was with them. He could forget about all the expectations and fears he had and just be himself. They would accept him for all his faults. Even when they teased him or played with his phobias, he could only find himself smiling.

The rush of memories of his friends was more than enough to cause his wand to quiver. Seeing each of them crowding around and encouraging him, the silver spell erupted from his wand, making all five of them jump back in surprise. The mist coiled and spun in a mass of light that eventually took on the small shape of a squirrel. Sho’s smile fell a little at the form of his patronus. He wasn’t sure whether to be insulted or charmed by the adorable spirit.

 

**Prefects**

Nino had been lazing about in the Recreation Hall with Ohno when the doors opened and the other three came hurrying in. Nino opened one eye as they approached with hasty steps. Ohno seemed to remain asleep with his head on the table until Aiba jumped up onto it, startling the Gryffindor awake.

“You guys won’t believe what just happened!” Aiba could barely contain his excitement.

Nino would venture to guess that whatever it was that had him so animated would probably only be mediocre to anyone else. He glanced at Sho and Jun to test his theory. Sho seemed completely relieved and was looking like his body had been replaced by that of a ragdoll in the way he slumped down into the sofa cushions. Jun, on the other hand, looked proud but still somehow managed to retain a certain humility that was revealed only in his eyes. The different reactions of the three of them had Nino questioning just what exactly had occurred.

Ohno yawned. “Are you going to tell us or do you actually want us to guess?” Aiba was still buzzing with excitement and couldn’t seem to stop fidgeting.

“It was just a normal day, right? Sho-chan and Matsujun were just going about their business when they ran into Ogura-san who told them Headmaster Johnny wanted to see them,” Aiba eagerly recalled his friends’ tale. “He then announced he had chosen them both as house prefects. How crazy is that?”

Ohno and Nino were silent for a moment as they let the news settle in. After a minute or two, the two of them went back to what they had been doing before the three of them came crashing in. Ohno rested his head back on the table, Nino leaning back in his seat with his eyes closed as he shuffled the cards in his hands.

Their reactions weren’t quite what their friends were expecting. Aiba’s eyes went wide with a loud cry of "eh!", while Sho jumped to his feet.

“Is that all?” Jun demanded, the pride he’d been feeling twisting into a bubbling anger at how blasé his friends were being. When they had found and told Aiba, he wouldn’t shut up about it. This was a great achievement for them. Surely Nino and Ohno should be more excited for them, or at the very least congratulate them.

“Congratulations,” Ohno yawned again without opening his eyes, as though he’d read Jun’s mind.

Jun frowned a little. Before when Johnny had told him he was to be a Gryffindor prefect, he’d been worried about telling the other two in fear of offending Ohno. Now he wished he hadn’t concerned himself with it.

Nino honestly didn’t see what the big deal was. What was the appeal about being a prefect anyway? All those responsibilities of looking out for first years, attending meetings and patrolling the hallways at night. They had to be organized and orderly and serious almost all the time, which Nino supposed was why both Sho and Jun were perfect fits.

He could feel two matching glares burning into him even with his eyes closed. He gave a sigh and looked at them. “If it’s what you want to do, I’m happy for you,” he said, secretly glad he hadn’t been chosen as Slytherin’s male prefect.


	6. Sixth Year

**Caught in the Common Room**

It was late. Jun cautiously looked over his shoulder as he snuck through the corridors and up the stairs to the entrance of the Gryffindor common room. He mumbled the password and crept inside, making as little noise as possible. He hoped no one would be awake to catch him. The place looked empty as he ascended the stairs that led to his dorm.

“Someone’s getting in late,” the voice rung out in the silence of the room as Jun was approaching his bed. He winced, stopping where he was. He gazed over his shoulder at where Ohno was sitting up on his bed with the side lamp dimly lit. His eyebrow rose in expectation, waiting patiently for an explanation from the taller boy.

Jun almost growled at his misfortune. Of course the only time Ohno wasn’t sleeping was the one time he needed him to be, and as a further slap in the face the expression he wore told Jun he knew exactly where he’d been.

“Late night study session,” Jun lied, trying to think of a decent excuse that would get him out of this tight situation.

“A session of kiss techniques?” Ohno guessed. He nodded towards his friend's neck, “Nice hickey.”

Jun’s face dropped, his hand coming up to cover the show of evidence that had given him away. There was a reason he didn’t like the idea of his partner marking him. Next time he would not allow Nino to talk his way around that particular vexation.

Jun sank down onto his bed, flopping back into the mattress and hugging a pillow to his chest as he desperately tried to put things out of his mind.

“I take it you and Nino had fun then,” Ohno continued to quiz him with more curiosity than anything else, though he didn’t seem to care that he’d turned the conversation from embarrassing to a topic that had Jun’s whole body seizing up in discomfort. It made Jun wonder if his friend was doing it deliberately, dragging the pillow over his face that was growing hotter with every passing moment.

“Why do you want to know?” he grumbled from under the cushion material.

Ohno shrugged. “I caught you sneaking into our room in the middle of the night, I don’t have a girlfriend currently, I’m curious as to how your relationship works, you’re both my friends and I’m entitled to be a bit nosey. You pick.”

Jun groaned at his response. It was starting to feel more like he was talking to Aiba rather than Ohno. He never thought his sleepy friend would be this much of a night owl.

“We made out in the courtyard for a bit, that’s all,” he spat. He could practically feel Ohno nodding thoughtfully. There were a few moments of silence and Jun was almost convinced Ohno had dropped the topic, or finally fallen asleep, until his voice cut through a moment later.

“Who dominates when you guys kiss?”

Jun threw the pillow at him.

 

**Mischief Managed**

When Nino approached the four of them holding a fold of parchment, they really should have known it wouldn’t be what it looked like it. Nino was a renowned trickster in Hogwarts, famous for his use of non-magical pranks with the ability to shock his classmates to the core. Such tricks included coughing up fake blood to get out of Muggle Studies, replacing the feasts in the Great Hall with artificial food and planting a mock manticore in the Quidditch equipment storage. That last one earnt him a weekend detention cleaning out the hospital wing for causing team-wide panic in the belief that one of the magical world’s most dangerous beasts had gotten into the school grounds. No team would go near the equipment storage for over three weeks after that incident as a safety precaution.

The four of them crowded around on Nino’s order as the snarky Slytherin showed them the blank parchment. Nino glanced around for any other students or teachers who might be too curious for their own good. After seeing no one, he removed his wand from his robes and held it to the middle of the paper.

“I solemnly swear I am up to no good,” said Nino. The five of them watched as a dot of ink appeared from beneath the tip of his wand, spreading out and streaking across the page when he lifted it away.

“Nice phrase, you come up with that yourself?” Aiba asked even as his eyes remained on the parchment. He didn’t see Nino’s hand coming up to swipe across his arm until it was too late. “Ouch!”

The map finished unveiling itself, an outline of Hogwarts castle positioned dead in the middle with the words ‘Marauders Map’ spelt out inside it.

“Marauders Map,” Jun echoed, looking up from the map to stare at Nino. The latter nodded.

“I pinched it from Himura-san’s office,” Nino grinned in a way that made him appear very pleased with himself. “It’s a map of everything in the Hogwarts region. It shows us secret passages, anything anyone in the grounds is doing, everything. Can you believe that moron had this? Didn’t take much to get my hands on it.”

“If it really shows us everyone, I don’t think we should be looking at this,” Sho stated. The others pouted when he took the opened map from Nino’s hands. “Come on guys, it’s an invasion of privacy. It’s not right that we—is that Shibata-san? What’s she doing there?”

Sho’s lecture on respect was cut short when he found the footsteps belonging to their inappropriate Divination’s professor slowly make her way inside the empty Recreation Hall where the boys spent most of their free time.

“Didn’t you leave your spare shirt in there?” Aiba reminded Sho, whose face had taken on a greenish tinge.

“Why is it only me?” he whined as Ohno rubbed his back gently. Sho glared down at the map. “Do you think if we showed this to the Headmaster he’ll tell Shibata-san off?”

“Doubt it,” Jun shook his head. “What happened to it being an invasion of privacy?”

“Forget that!” Sho shouted. “This,” he waved his arm wildly in the general direction of the where the Recreation Hall was marked on the map, “is an invasion of privacy.”

He tossed the map back at Nino and ran off. His friends could only guess he had gone to salvage whatever of his belongings he could from the Recreation Hall. Nino had a smug smile on his face as they tailed him.

“I knew he’d come around eventually.”

 

**Learning to Apparate**

Students that were seventeen or would turn seventeen before or on the 31st of August in their sixth year at Hogwarts were entitled to start taking Apparition classes if they chose. It was a twelve-day course, complete with an individual skill test that would earn students their apparition licence if they were to pass.

Jun knew how lucky he was that he’d made the cut by a day and was thrilled at the chance to learn the teleportation skill offered to them. He’d been among the first students to sign up and pay the course’s fee. Nino was also keen to learn how to apparate. He saw it as a convenient method of travel and a sure-fire way to improve his pranks. Aiba was a strange combination of being overly enthusiastic towards the apparition classes and dreading them. Splinching was something that caused a shiver down his spine every time he thought about it happening, in spite of having willingly put himself if much more life-threatening situations with his experiments and the wild animals he called pets. Sho similarly was terrified of the thought of splinching, but perhaps even more so of letting down his family and their expectations. His friends were amazed by the way he pushed his fears to the side and signed up for the classes, studying the teleportation technique like they’d never seen before.

The only one who hadn’t chosen to sign up for the classes was Ohno. When they asked him why, he’d merely said he saw no reason as to why he’d have to apparate on his own. There were plenty of other methods of transportation out there that he was already familiar with and didn’t want to spend time and money learning another one. Even though his friends had tried to convince him to give the course a try, he’d refused.

In their first apparition class, there was a splinching incident. Only a mild and actually rather amusing one once the students had gotten over the initial shock. It had happened to Nino, who’d lacked enough deliberation before apparating. A soft pile of black remained in the spot Nino had been standing as the Slytherin student appeared on the other side of the room as intended. He looked proudly at the rest of his class, unaware that anything had gone wrong until he caught his reflection in the window. His head was completely smooth with not a single hair remaining. He let out a startled cry and ran back over to where his hair had been left behind.

His friends unsuccessfully tried to restrain their laughter. The professor had warned splinching may occur but none of them had expected their bratty friend to walk out of the first class with no hair. Already Nino was arguing with the teacher and demanding he fix it. The teacher, who was having a hard time keeping from laughing himself, did all he could to assure him the nurses in the hospital would have a quick remedy for his unexpected hair loss. Nino’s face fell as he knew that meant having to walk through the school and all the way up to the hospital wing bald. Jun, Sho and Aiba came up to his side.

“At least you didn’t lose an arm,” Jun tried to keep him optimistic but Nino kept frowning.

“I think I would have preferred that,” he muttered darkly. “What about my reputation?”

Aiba’s eyes suddenly lit up in the same way they usually did when he got one of his crazy ideas. He pulled out his wand while Sho checked with the teacher if it would be okay for one of them to accompany the shaken Nino to the hospital to get fixed.

Nino hid behind Jun and used him as a human shield when Aiba pointed the wand towards him. “No way are you hexing my hair back!” he growled threateningly.

Aiba laughed. “That’s not what I was going to do! Galerum Capitura,” he cast a spell, a white cotton headdress materializing in his hands a second later. The sides and back of it had strands of black hair coming down from the sides at appropriate lengths. Before Nino could protest, Aiba had placed the strange wig on his head and was readjusting it so that it looked like he was wearing a towel over his hair.

“There!” Aiba said proudly. “No one will know the difference.”

Sho came back over saying they’d gotten the green light from the teacher. He stopped in his tracks when he saw Nino wearing Aiba’s invention, having to literally bite his tongue to keep him from saying anything or bursting into laughter yet again. Nino could read his expression though and very nearly ripped the disguise from his head to throw at the two of them. He was only partly thankful when Jun took him by the arm and led him away before he did just that.

“Let’s get you to the hospital,” Jun said calmly, wrapping his arm around him. “They’ll be able to fix you right up.”

Nino grumbled something indecipherable, but allowed himself to be led out of the Great Hall and through the school. He was beginning to understand why Ohno hadn’t wanted to take these classes.

**Author's Note:**

> These drabbles are inspired by a collection of edits I made. http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/matsu1nino/76718964/3435/3435_900.jpg


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